The first residents of the land that will become our butterfly garden were likely, well—butterflies—and many other winged, and multi-footed species who thrived in the Eastern Deciduous Forest biome that makes up much of Sangamon County.
The first two-legged caretakers were likely the Kickapoo, members of the Illiniwek Confederation, or Potawatomi people. It was the Potawatomi who loaned us their word for the name of the county. According to Athens, Ill., resident George Godfrey, a member of the Potawatomi and a tribal historian, in Potawatomi Sain-guee-mon means “a place of plenty of food.”
In July 1892 Charles Routt purchased most of the land now occupied by Sacred Heart-Griffin High School and Sacred Heart Convent—between Monroe and Washington, Lincoln and Amos streets. The sellers were the heirs of Adelia Dubois, widow of one-time Illinois Auditor General Jesse K. Dubois and included: Lincoln Dubois, Jesse K. Dubois II, Fred Dubois, and Adelia Dubois Briscoe and her husband Carroll Briscoe.
Mr. Routt made the purchase for $7,000 on behalf of the Academy of St. Rose of Lima (the name under which the sisters’ school was incorporated in Jacksonville). The deed to the property was handed over to our sisters, but it excluded about 2.5 acres on the Washington Street boundary because that land was occupied by someone else at the time. 
In August of 1883 that land was purchased from Adelia Dubois, the widow of Illinois State Auditor Jesse K. Dubois, by one Elizabeth McConnell, the wife of Gen. John McConnell, commander of the 5th Illinois Volunteer Cavalry during the Civil War. Based on deeds and plat books in the Sangamon Valley Collection at Lincoln Public Library in Springfield, at least some portion of the butterfly garden will be on the McConnel property.
That land was eventually acquired by the sisters on a date we have yet to determine but perhaps sometime after General McConnell’s death in 1898.
This land has certainly been “sain-guee-mon”—a land of plenty for all of creation since time immemorial. Now, with the creation of the Butterfly Garden, we hope to once again make this small portion a land of plenty and a source of solidarity, spirituality, social wellbeing, and solace for all who live on or pass by this parcel of God’s creation, lovingly cared for by generations of stewards.
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